


Words I Can't Say

by Saraste



Series: Crash and Burn [1]
Category: Supernatural, Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: (which mean Stiles), Age Difference Issues, Angst, Consent issues related to demonic possession, Demon posession, Derek doesn't think he deserves nice things, Kissing, M/M, Mental Anguish, Non-Graphic Violence, Not at all season 3a compliant, Not entirely season 2 compliant, PTSD, Panic Attacks, Pining, Slow Build, Trapped within one's own body due to demon possession, Violence, canon type violence, cross-over
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-03
Updated: 2013-12-21
Packaged: 2018-01-03 09:44:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 19
Words: 20,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1068988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saraste/pseuds/Saraste
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek's afraid that it'll all happen and that he, the responsible adult still, even with all his defects and broken pieces, won't be able to say no. Because he needs to. Stiles is just a kid. Stiles doesn't need to be near him, because Derek knows he's bad news, he'll bring more danger into Stiles life than ever before if he were to give in, if he'd let himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Too Broken to Cry

_"Don't cry. Tears won't help."_

* * *

 

It's the anniversary of the fire, the first since Derek came back to Beacon Hills and Derek is absolutely wrecked.

 

This year, it's all too much, way too much, after the year he's had. First Laura and then finding out that it was Peter who'd killed her and then killing Peter himself. There's been too much death in too short a space of time to get back to where he... hurt a little less with each passing year because now, all of his family is dead now.

 

He won't cry. Hasn't, since the first few months when he and Laura huddled together in their grief and during which Laura kept moving them about because she didn't feel safe anywhere and because she hadn't know where the threat had come from, who'd lit the fire because Derek hadn't been able to bring himself to tell her. And even then, even then during those first few months after the fire the tears had usually come at night when they were sleeping all curled up in one bedf, crying each other to sleep because no words were never gonna make anything right.

 

And now Laura is gone and Derek has no-one to cry with. He's kinda afraid to cry, not that he'd admit to it, because if he did, he isn't sure that the tears would never ever dry up. He thinks he would cry until he couldn't breathe, until there was nothing to him but a sobbing sad mess and he just _can't. Won't._

 

Instead, he rages,right after things seem to not be all death or death anymore, after Peter is... gone. Runs through the preserve and growls to the moon. Rouses the Argents suspicions sky-high as he does but he notices that he doesn't fucking care.

 

Doesn't care that they might come and decide that he's a threat, that he can just be made dead now, for all the trouble he's caused. For the ruckus his making, such a ruckus that it makes it into the local paper and when he shops for the bare necessities he can hear conversations between the other shopper,all in scared tones over the loud creepy animal noises in the woods.

 

He doesn't care.

 

Derek knows it would be better to just maybe cry it out but it seems he's all cried out. Sometimes he even wonders what the hell he's even still doing in Beacon Hills to be honest. There is nothing but death to him here. Well, he _knows_ why he won't leave, why he's torturing himself by staying. And it's not because of his dysfunctional pack of beaten up teens. No. It's because he can't leave well enough alone, because, in the one corner of his shredded and badly patched-together-again soul, there is a glimmer of hope, a part of him that still thinks that maybe, maybe he could still have good things, despite the train wreck which is his life.

 

Could still have one good thing, even when that hopeful part of him is dead afraid that he'll ruin it, like he does everything in his life.

 

Even then, when Stiles shows up at the house, where Derek's spent the day of the anniversary in abject misery, decidedly not crying, not even howling because he still retains some speck of self-preservation, Derek doesn't make him go away. Because he just _can't._ The day has drained him of the will to make Stiles go, to fling nasty words at him, maybe shove him a little. So, he lets Stiles sit beside himself on the ruined remains of the porch and they just remain there in silence and it's _fine_.

 

It's Stiles who breaks the silence between them, because it just always is him, it's not in his genetic makeup to remain wordless, not even in a situation like this.

 

“Have you cried?” he asks, softly, compassionately, and his voice doesn't make Derek want to have his arm slung around his shoulders, it doesn't. Even when it so does. But that would break some boundaries, make more out of this than what this, what they have, is. It would be bad for Stiles, because his presence in Derek's life is fraying on Derek's last bits of resolve.

 

Stiles is someone Derek can't have but what he wants, sometimes aches, to have in his life. But he can't, because it wouldn't be... There's too much of an age-difference between them. If Derek were to give in, he'd be no better than _her_.

 

Even if he does l---

 

And that's a thing that's dangerous to think about, especially when Stiles is around, Derek can't get comfortable with such a thought, not when Stiles is _right there_ all golden brown eyes and cinnamon boy smell and words. Words which Derek should answer with some of his own before Stiles thinks somethings up, before, maybe, Stiles will say something Derek can't make him unsay. For he knows that there is lust, in Stiles's part, maybe even more and he can't, _just can't_ , give Stiles any leeway, any crack where he might slip in and take permanent residence in Derek's heart... even when he so completely has.

 

But Derek isn't Kate. Who he shouldn't even think, whose name he shouldn't utter even in his head on this day of all days. Instead, he answers Stiles, who's here, who has no agenda to intentionally hurt Derek and who would never plot to kill his family if Derek had any family left to kill.

 

“No,” he answers Stiles, after rattling around in his short time memory for what Stiles had actually asked. “No, I've not cried.” He doesn't add 'can't' cos that's giving away too much, that's too raw. Except that, with Stiles there, with him there, tethering Derek, he kinda thinks that he could cry. And that's a dangerous thought.

 

It's terse, his tone final and he hopes Stiles will get it. Not that he will but Derek is still putting it out there for the infinitesimal chance that he possibly might.

 

Then there it is. Stiles' hand. On his shoulder. Stiles' heart thudding in his ears, it's steady beat, which Derek would never admit to having memorized, faltering a bit, anxious. Like Stiles is waiting Derek to fling it off, turn to him and snarl.

 

Which, of course, because when is life ever fair and because it's suddenly all way too much to cope with, is not what Derek does at all. Even when part of him wants to. What he does is cry, even when part of him is sure that it won't make anything feel better, even when he knows that he shouldn't with Stiles there, because it's too intimate and the tears won't help. Crying won't make his family any less dead. They won't make his life any less miserable, the porch he's sitting any less burned out the house any less a derelict, a broken burnt tomb of memories and lives cut too short.

 

Derek just sits there, with Stiles' hand on his shoulder, letting it all out, all the tears he's been bottling up for years, all the tears he didn't shed after Laura died, even the ones he knew he would have wept for Peter, the Peter he'd known before the fire, not the crazed, burnt post-coma Peter. Stiles is there, silent for once and it is enough... and all too much.

 

And even when Derek had thought that crying wouldn't make him feel better, it kinda does, mostly because Stiles is there with him.

 

When Derek's drying his face, when the shadows have long ago gone and been replaced with starlit darkness and the night is chilly around them, the wood of the charred steps cold under where they sit, Stiles is still there. And only then does he speak again.

 

“It's ok to cry. You can't bottle it up like that.” And then, because Stiles has no self-preservation skills, or because he just loses his brain-to-mouth filter around Derek, he continues, his heart-rate hopping. “When _was_ the last time you cried, cos that sounded like years of not crying.”

 

Derek is surprised that he even answers, must be the crying making him open up, or this particular day making him emotionally vulnerable and thus talkative. Or the way Stiles asks, his tone, the cadence of his heartbeat, his smell, which Derek could pinpoint in a crowd. It's dangerous and Derek shouldn't have let Stiles stay.

 

“The months after the fire, when I was on the road with Laura...” he replies and clicks his mouth shut because that, he's never told that to _anyone_. His eyes flick to Stiles because he cannot _not_ look, he _needs_ to see the face he makes, which he can see, because of his wolf eyes, even when his ears can easily pick up the tick of Stiles' heartbeat, hear the gasp the words wring out from Stiles' lips.

 

Can almost taste the compassion in the cool air between them. Kind of wants to kiss Stiles to make him forget he ever heard anything. Even when that would be wrong.

 

“Oh,” is all Stiles has to say to that and even that feels too much, because Derek just _can't_ have him growing attached, starting to care, because he knows he'll wreck Stiles, because he can't do normal. Stiles doesn't deserve to be wrecked, not the way Derek was, Stiles needs someone his own age, not an adult creep years his senior who has issues by the bucketful. A man who can't even cry on the anniversary of his family's death before this boy, _this_ _boy_ , came and wrenched the tears out, unscrewed whatever stopper there was on Derek's tear-ducts and just made him loose all the tears he'd bottled in so carefully over the years, just bleeding inside.

 

“Stiles...” Derek growls, because this, this is dangerous, veering on the precipice of not-okay-at-all, even when Derek wants it so bad.

 

He's afraid that Stiles will give in to the demands of the climbing heartbeat which is filling Derek's ears, that Stiles will lean closer, that the hand on Derek's shoulder will turn into arms around him, that the words will morph into tentative, fumbling kisses.

 

Derek's afraid that it'll all happen and that he, the responsible adult still, even with all his defects and broken pieces, won't be able to say no. Because he needs to. Stiles is just a kid. Stiles doesn't need to be near him, because Derek knows he's bad news, he'll bring more danger into Stiles life than ever before if he were to give in, if he'd let himself.

 

“I cried every night for a year when my mom died,” Stiles admits, his voice hitching and his heartbeat stumbling over the memories Derek knows that the words must summon up. “Then I stopped. But I still cry every year, on the day of her death. Because I know she wouldn't want me to, she'd want me to be happy and not so sad over her every day... It's okay to mourn.”

 

Derek really wants to throw his plans to the wind, just fuck it and kiss Stiles right there and then, try and claim him as his. But he won't.

 

Eventually, Stiles leaves, Derek walks him back to his jeep cos it's dark, and Stiles grumbles. There are no big bad things that go bump in the night besides the pack in Beacon Hills now, so he's safe to walk to his jeep, Stiles tells Derek. Derek just ignores him.

 

When Derek walks back to the shell of a house with rooms filled with the ghosts of his family, of memories that are burnt at the edges now, seared into his soul, he realizes that Stiles was the only one who'd remember what that day was. His pack were mostly too young to remember, and he hadn't talked about the fire, ever, but Stiles... Stiles had come.

 

Derek realizes that even if he keeps himself away, shoves his feelings for Stiles in some dark hidden corner of his heart, never to be acted on, he's already lost.

 

Because Stiles is attached and Derek isn't sure he can ever keep him away.

 

 


	2. Afraid of Myself

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles is all gangly too long legs, fragile human bones and skin, breakable. He's not tough, like Derek needs. He'd let Derek break him, a little at least, just to show he won't fall apart by a touch, a too rough kiss, a shove. He hasn't, all the times Derek's smashed him into hard surfaces are clear proof of it.

_"The snow is warm. The ice is hot."_

* * *

Derek is like a solid weight against him, there's no budging him, no dislodging him and no kicking him away from inside his heart, where he's nestled, like Stiles deserves to have him there. He doesn't, of course he doesn't, because why would Derek want to have someone like him?

 

When he could have so much better?

 

Stiles is all gangly too long legs, fragile human bones and skin, breakable. He's not tough, like Derek needs. He'd let Derek break him, a little at least, just to show he won't fall apart by a touch, a too rough kiss, a shove. He hasn't, all the times Derek's smashed him into hard surfaces are clear proof of it.

 

Derek couldn't break him all the way if he tried.

 

Well, except that he could, he so could, with claw and fangs and super strenght. But Stiles has never seen him lose it that bad, not that that means that Derek wouldn't, ever. And maybe that's part of the attraction, part of why Derek's snuck into Stiles heart, made a home there and Stiles never wants him to be anywhere else, to be honest. Never wants him to be gone.

 

Except that...

 

… Derek's never been there, never been with Stiles, so he couldn't even be gone when he hasn't been there to begin with. Sure, he has, but never in the way Stiles aches with all the pent up lust a teenaged virgin boy has. But Stiles knows, at least he hopes that he knows, that it's more than that, it's not just lust. He wants Derek forever. And that thought scares the shit out of him. Because he's young, should he even be thinking about forever? Also, with the way Derek's living his life, would there even be a forever?

 

Though, to be honest, darkly honest, all of them are living on the knife edge of death these days. There is always another threat, another thing to fight, another thing to fear, something which could and would leave a trail of dead bodies in it's wake.

 

And god does Stiles want to be with Derek in any way he can before that happens. But Derek's all distant, stony and cold but mixed with hotness, hotness which burns, makes Stiles kinda afraid-aroused. Which is not normal by a long shot. No sirree! It's always life and death with them, Stiles doesn't know, but wants to oh-so-bad what normal with Derek would be like. Not their normal, but normal people normal. No death or life, no running through the night cos if you stop your might as well draw a gun to your head and shoot yourself because the running is all that keeps death from catching up to you. The normal when there are days that you wake up after a proper nights sleep and face a new day without dread, without fear of the things that you know are coming, bad things.

 

Bad things like now.

 

There's a freak snowstorm in Beacon Hills. Snow in California is not normal in any conceivable way so it has to be a witch or some other magic user controlling the weather, Stiles decides. Also, what the hell is his luck that his beloved Jeep freezes up and he can't get her going again? And has no cell reception whatsoever to boot.

 

He's sure he'll freeze up in the snow and be buried in it and his dad will cry and Scott will cry and it will be awful all around. Mostly since he's not kissed Derek yet or got his stab at forever with him or seen Derek naked. He knows he's not thinking rational at all. He knows. And that he never ever should have left the car, even when the heater wasn't working. Why is he even walking, wading through the snow, it's fucking knee-deep, oh right, he was going to try and get to Derek's. What a brilliant plan, that was. He's sinking into the snow, not caring, freezing but then not. The snow suddenly feels warm and he's just sinking into it's deadly embrace...

 

And then he's not. Then he's jolted awake, with warm hands around him, holding him close, warming him up, snatching him away from a cold death of hypothermia. Stiles can't, later, even tell how close to it he was because Derek won't tell him.

 

“Are you a complete idiot?” Derek asks him, which Stiles thinks is a bit much from a man who still sorta part-time lives in the _house his whole family died in_. But, yeah, maybe it's a valid question, all things considered.

 

“No,” Stiles still answers, cos why admit to idiocy? And is it idiocy when it gets him this, Derek's hands around him, seems his whole body wrapped in Derek's arms and legs, warm leeching from the big bad werewolf and into him. Maybe he hadn't aimed for this specifically when he'd left the car but he'll take what he can get, now.

 

Derek's hand kinda shake, which is like _whoa_ , when he tugs Stiles in closer, holds him tighter. Not that Stiles is going anywhere. Derek's warmth makes the coldness in him go away, makes him feel less like a human pop sickle.

 

Also, Derek's leaning over him, which is clearly a mistake and so mister Broody McWerepants has no-one else to blame than himself, because, really, what else does he expect Stiles to do than what Stiles ends up doing?

 

Which, of course, is leaning up and kissing Derek, even when it ends too soon cos of Derek's stupid hands all around him, keeping onto him tight. So Stiles ends up falling back downwards again as Derek's lips escape his, retreat in a way that is totally so not fair.

 

“Stiles...” And Stiles knows that tone, has heard it way more often than what he would have liked to, so many times that it feels like it's lost all meaning. There is a long pause, and they are just there, Derek not letting him go, their eyes locked and Stiles is screaming in his head for Derek to just fucking give in because what he's doing, refusing to acknowledge this thing, this huge thing they both know is between them, it's just wrong to try and pretend it's not there. “ _Don't_ ,” Derek says then.

 

Stiles looks up at him, right into Derek's stupidly pretty green-grey eyes and sighs and shivers, a bit cold even when he shouldn't be. “You shouldn't have told me that thing about Laura,” and suddenly, there's a surge of anger in him because who does Derek think he is, who does he think he is that he gets to decide this for both of them, “you shouldn't have. I know you trust me and you know why I was there that day and... why do you have to run away from everything?” he finishes.

 

Derek sighs, deep and bone-weary. “Am I running now, Stiles?” he asks, his eyes pointedly looking at his arms, the way he's holding Stiles tight in his lap, wrapped in his arms and an old worn blanket.

 

The charred bones of the old Hale house creak and groan around them, the wind howls outside. Suddenly Stiles wonders why he can even see Derek's face but thinks that there must be some light source, but it's not important.

 

“You know well what the hell I mean... Derek,” he says pointedly. “Why can't we be... us? What are you afraid of?”

Derek takes a long time to answer, or so Stiles thinks, and Derek just fucking sits there, fucking sits there and holds him in his lap like it's normal, but maybe it's cos he can't let go of Stiles. And Stiles fucking needs to know how it'll all end, what the fuck the answer is because this, this is too much.

 

“Myself,” Derek finally says and then, because of why Stiles can't tell, he swoops down and kisses Stiles and it's fucking everything and nothing else matters.


	3. Frozen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Derek is kissing Stiles until suddenly, he isn't anymore. Then he's falling...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hypothermia related facts might be a little iffy.

_"You can buy a peach. But where can you buy an orchard in full bloom?"_

Yet, as sudden as that, once Derek's lips were on Stiles', kissing him like it was the only thing in the world, they were also gone.

 

”Derek?” Stiles asked, stunned, pleased and confused all wrapped into one head full of thoughts that didn't take root, his brain being overpowered in the wake of the kiss. It had just been getting real good, too, he'd let his mouth fall open and was sure Derek would have stuck his tongue into it, he knew he'd been about to explore Derek's himself. And, _oh_ , he was _hard_.

 

Derek's hands were gripping on Stiles' arms, either holding him away or wanting to pull him back in, well, maybe not the latter option.

 

Stiles shivers, because he's cold again, his whole body shaking, now that he's not pressed right next to Derek again. “Fuck, if you're not gonna kiss me then either hold me closer or take me home... or a hospital?” Suddenly Stiles' eyes sprang wide open and he feels completely alert and awake. “Oh my god, did that happen or am I imagining this, trapped into some hypothermia dream and I'm gonna die?!”

 

He can't breathe, just can't, the air doesn't make it into his lungs, not inside of them and he just _can't._ He's shaking because this must be it. Why the hell would Derek even kiss him anyway? He was scrawny, talked too much and wasn't sex on legs, like Derek, who was more broody sex on legs but that's besides the point. OH MY GOD HE WAS STILL TRAPPED IN A SNOW DRIFT AND FREEZING TO DEATH!

 

Derek's looking at him, Stiles' face smushed between his surprisingly gentle hands, and Derek's looking straight at him. “That happened, this is real, you're not drying. Also, never say stuff like that aloud ever again.”

 

“But if this is happening why aren't you kissing me again?” Stiles demands once more and realizes that he might be a bit loopy from his frozen adventure. A little bit.

 

Derek fucking growls, almost shifting, his grip so tight Stiles thinks he'll bruise. But Stiles doesn't get, doesn't want to get this cold-hot-cold thing that Derek's going. You don't get to kiss someone and then pull away and pretend like it's nothing, like it wasn't what you wanted, not even if you're fucking Derek Hale. Stiles really is tired of Derek's bullshit. Ok, so Derek's older than him and he's a teenager but if kissing is all they do? How is that so bad? How could it be?

 

“Because it isn't okay,” Derek sounds pained, like he wants to scream the words at Stiles but can't, because Stiles has hypothermia and you don't scream at people who have hypothermia.

 

“Bull,” Stiles counters, punctuated by a long yawn, man he's tired. Cold and tired. He wants to just sleep forever. Sleep in Derek's arms.

 

He does fall asleep, slips into it like it's nothing, so easy, not afraid at all that he maybe shouldn't. The next time he wakes up is somewhere else. There's a suspiciously familiar tile ceiling above him but it's the scent and the sounds which tell him where he is like nothing else can.

 

Beacon Hills hospital, one of the places in Beacon Hills which he most hates, for obvious reasons.

 

“Stiles...” It's his dad, sounding worried and Stiles hates being the reason.

 

Stiles turns his head and looks at his dad, who's sitting in a chair by the bed and give him a weak smile. There's an IV hooked to his arm and Stiles wonders how long did he lie in the snow to need and IV. How long had he lain there before Derek had found him, before Derek had tried to warm him, had kissed him and then tried to pretend like they weren't happening. Derek had given in that little bit but it only left Stiles wanting for more, for everything that Derek could give him. For everything Stiles was sure Derek wanted to have with him but thought that he shouldn't. Because of reasons.

 

“How long?” Stiles asked his dad and sighed happily when his dad got up and bent to hug him.

 

“A few hours,” his dad tells him. “You really scared me, son. I don't why you'd ---”

 

Stiles knows what the words his dad swallows would have been. Knows all too well.

 

“I don't know.” And he doesn't. And that scares _him._


	4. Wrong

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Derek isn't in the hospital. Stiles panics. Also, Beacon Hills is being buried in snow which is not normal.

_"However, returning to the world like this proves nothing."_

”Where's Derek?” Stiles asks, because he cannot _not_ ask, he needs to know with an ache that is startling, even after all he's said told Derek, after all the words he's poured out, after all he knows of how they are hurtling towards each other, ready to crash. And they had done that already, hadn't they?

 

Stiles is so happy now that his dad knows about the werewolf thing, because if he would have had to keep both that and his feelings towards Derek from him... Stiles knew with startling clarity that it would tear him apart. Plus, his dad is safer in knowing, Stiles hopes. He has to be, more intel over threats equals safer against them... well, at least if his dad doesn't go against hostile werewolves or something on his own, as there is a lot he doesn't know about fighting them. (And it had not been like Stiles would have been able to sneak wolfs bane laced bullets into his dad's service revolver without his dad noticing and him having to explain why he was tampering with his dad's gun.)

 

His dad takes his time answering. Finally, he does, convincing Stiles that his version of guilt-tripping puppy eyes works on his dad still. Not that Stiles uses them that much these days... not after all the lies. Guilt-tripping his dad into things leaves a bad taste in his mouth now, unless it involves his dad's diet, then all bets are off.

 

“He went home...” His dad tells Stiles, “or whatever odd version of home he has.” His dad looks confused and Stiles suddenly thinks that he knows where this is headed. Maybe he shouldn't have asked, even when not knowing where Derek is is driving him to distraction. And then his dad does the expected. “Where does he even live now?”

 

Stiles realizes that his dad really doesn't know, even when the question itself was clearly coming. And he promises himself that he has to guilt Scott into helping him convince Derek to move out of the old Hale house. For public safety, Derek's safety and for the safety of puppies and, no, that was from Buffy, but for the calm of Stiles' mind. Even when, if Derek had lived in town, Stiles would most likely still lie buried in snow, oh so close to a frozen death by now.

 

“At the old Hale house...” Stiles tells his dad, because there's no avoiding the truth ugly as it is, wincing a bit as he moves up on the bed, he feels sore inside, and out, even when that doesn't maybe make sense.

 

Stiles hears his dad suck in a breath at his words. “Is he crazy?” His dad asks.

 

Stiles just chuckles darkly. “No, he's just Derek Hale, mister Broody McWerepants,” he tells his dad.

 

“But how can he bear it... doesn't he? _We_ barely survived and he...”

 

And oh my god his dad is sympathizing with Derek-bloody-infuriating-Hale! Suddenly Stiles feels that he must still be in a crazy post-hypothermia delusion, even when he gets why his dad feels for Derek. Despite having arrested him not that long time ago. But losing family members and the grief that's attached? That is what his dad gets. Sympathizes with.

 

Maybe Stiles won't have to keep Derek a secret from his dad if he can get past all the Alpha's problems and carve a place for himself by his side, show Derek that he deserves some happiness, too, not just welling in his sorrow and distancing himself from everyone.

 

“Yeah, Derek's not big on the moving on, or functioning like a normal person when it comes to trying to move on.” Stiles tells his dad. “Maybe he was better before he came back to Beacon Hills, don't know. Kinda wish I did.”

 

“Do I need to have a talk with him over how he treats you?” his dad asks and that, that just makes all the air whoosh out of Stiles' lungs and his heart monitor beep wildly. He hadn't even noticed he was hooked up into one.

 

Well, it is a bit too much, even when his dad _is_ the sheriff and very, very perceptive (even with how long Stiles had managed to keep the werewolf situation from him and his dad not figuring it out on his own). Calm, he needs to calm down before he has a panic attack. He feels it edging, coming closer and closer. He isn't usually this easy to slip into them, but, ok, so his nerves are a bit frayed in the wake of his near brush with death, after all. He can feel it close, lurking and he doesn't want to. No-one's dying, he's safe, his dad's safe, Derek's, supposedly, safe.

 

And this isn't... isn't... doesn't feel right. There's... But he can't gather his thoughts because it's so hard to breathe and... But no... this isn't... why can't he...

 

Then his dad is looking straight into his eyes, anchoring him, hands cupping his face and Stiles kinda hates himself that he has so many problems, that he makes his dad worry this much.

 

“Stiles, look at me, breathe. Everything is fine. I'm not mad, well... but no. Breathe. Breathe. Breathe...”

 

It takes several breaths but then the feeling of an impending, almost-happening, panic attack tapers off and he's present, fully present and his thoughts settled, following his dad's words. His hands are holding onto his dad's arms and the IV hurts a bit but Stiles doesn't care.

 

“How bad was it? When Derek brought me in?” He has to ask, because this hair-trigger situation is not normal. Not even after... or so he thinks.

 

“Well, he should have brought you in straight after he dragged you up from the snow,” his dad says and snatches him into a tight hug. “But there's something... the doctors didn't think you were in the snow that long. There's something...”

 

So there _was_ something, Stiles hadn't imagined the wrongness of it, but it'll have to wait.

 

“So I'm?...” Stiles doesn't know what to say, which is scary enough. Because he _always_ has something to say. Always.

 

“You're awake and should be fine, they tell me.”

 

But then a nurse comes in, of course, a doctor at his heels and Stiles is not convinced at all that what his dad says is the truth, that it will be ok. Because the look on the doctors face... yeah, not really a confidence boost. Also, the wrongness of the near-panic-attack? Not calm inducing at all.

 

“Oh god am I dying?” Stiles blurts out the first thing which comes to his mouth, as the doctor examines him, frowns at the heart-monitor and looks at Stiles with a frown.

 

“No,” the doctor answers, quick and to the point, “but we are keeping you in overnight and maybe tomorrow. Running a few tests, as you reaction to hypothermia was a bit... extreme, and I want to monitor you.”

 

“The whole snowstorm is a bit extreme,” Stiles' dad puts in. He's now sitting back in the chair as the doctor and nurse hover over Stiles.

 

Stiles sees the doctor nod and frown. “Yes. This _is_ Beacon Hills and it's now four feet deep and it's still going strong,” the doctor shakes his head while he jots down some things into Stiles' chart. “It's not normal in any way.”

 

And that, that gives Stiles something to focus on. Not normal is what he can work with. Because four feet of snow in Beacon Hills is overkill and reeks of magic to Stiles, so maybe his over the top reaction is just because of the magic... which could also mean that there is something hostile after him which is just what his life is these days.

 


	5. Not Stalking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Derek is not stalking Stiles. He's just making sure he's ok.

_"I work. I slave. I drive myself like a locomotive."_

Derek is not stalking Stiles. He's just making sure the boy is okay. He had left before the sheriff had come to the hospital because that was one conversation Derek was going to postpone until much much later, if ever. Derek can't believe what had happened. Stiles had seemed to be ok, getting warmer and his skin had felt warmer, far warmer than the icy coldness that had met Derek's hands when he'd lifted Stiles up from the snow.

 

They had talked when Stiles had woken up, they had kissed, even when Derek had tried to keep himself away from doing just that. Had wanted it more than anything and still known that he _shouldn't have_. Because Stiles was still all too young and Derek did not want to become Kate.

 

Even when he knew that he could never be her.

 

If he was, he never would have taken Stiles into the hospital, explaining that he'd found him in the snow, freezing, then taking his hasty retreat before anyone could stop him. But Derek had lingered, had made himself stay around the hospital, even when it smelled like death to him, even when it made his skin crawl and his wolf wanting to run and flee. And even when he had wanted to leave, he also wanted to stay as stubbornly. Because Stiles is inside, because he had heard Stiles' hear-beat start to falter, because his skin had suddenly been so cold that it had seemed to _burn_ Derek's fingers through Stiles' clothes.

 

So Derek stays. Looks on when Stiles' father, the sheriff, arrives, runs into the hospital, the terror of his heart ringing in Derek's ears even when Derek isn't that close to the doors.

 

Derek strides, runs around the perimeter of the hospital for what feels like hours but possibly isn't. Finally he takes to haunting the halls of the hospital, trying to remain unseen. He follows Stiles' scent, this way and that, until he finds his room. He waits, skirting nurses who would tell him to go, until he can hear Stiles' father fall asleep.

 

Then Derek slips into Stiles' room and stands by his bed, because he can't keep away.

 

 

 


	6. Basic Things

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Derek can't stay away from Stiles.

"Waiting to die isn't living."

 

Derek knows full well what he deserves and what he doesn't.

 

Stiles fit in the latter category even when he's crawled under Derek's skin, even when, sometimes, he seems to be all that Derek thinks about. Well, when he's not thinking about basic things like survival and how he got his whole family quilt because he'd thought with his dick. Although he might know that that last one isn't entirely true, knows that Kate probably would have had a go at his family even if Derek hadn't fallen at her feet, begging for whatever attention she deigned to give him.

 

Derek knows this.

 

It doesn't make his self-hate any less constant. It's why he thinks he doesn't deserve to be cared for. It's why he finds it so fucking hard to care for others, let them care for him. Because, in the end, you can't really trust anyone. Caring is dangerous because it leads to trust. Caring breaks you. Trust breaks you. And then, all you have left is revenge but when that's all done with? What is there in life but striving to survive as best as you could before your inevitable death caught up with you?

 

Yet, here he is, standing still amidst the fading glamor of hospital machinery mixed with the groans and hisses of humans dying slow drawn-out deaths, until all those other noises face away and all he can hear is the steady thrum of Stiles' heart, the soft in-out rhythm of his steady breathing.

 

Derek is there because he can't be a good man, he can't keep away from this ridiculous loud boy who holds such sway over his emotions, his decisions. Because Stiles' mere existence, his presence, his insistent presence in Derek's life and it's fringes is chipping away at the wall Derek has had around his heart. Derek likes to pretend that it's there still, strong as ever when, in reality, it might already be gone for all the control he has when Stiles is concerned.

 

It isn't safe knowing Stiles' heartbeat in a crowd. It isn't safe to be able to smell his lingering scent days after he's been somewhere. It isn't safe to feel warm inside by just hearing his voice. It isn't safe to turn and see those golden cinnamon eyes looking at him and want to look back with as much intent as them.

 

Good thing that Stiles is sleeping, then.

 

Even when that isn't safe either. Because, maybe, that's even more dangerous. Derek finds himself wanting to get up on the hospital bed and curl beside Stiles and just hold him, hold him and make sure that he's alive, feel that he's not shivering, that his heart isn't stuttering in his chest, even when he can hear it's steady beat just fine from where he's standing a feet away. Derek _wants_ and that's not... that isn't allowed.

 

Not allowed but still the truth. Derek's gone on Stiles so deep that nothing save death can make him not want him, not need him. He wants to cuddle Stiles, hear his words, silence them with a kiss, with a taste, with a...

 

He notices that he's taken a step toward the bed without even noticing.

 

And how can his thoughts even stray _there_ when Stiles is in a hospital? How can they go down that road when Stiles needs nothing more then recuperation?

 

The unnatural snowstorm howls outside the hospital, rattling the windows as it spews more and more snow all over Beacon Hills. Derek has a stray thought that he should be worried about that, he really should be. Because it's now reached eight feet deep and it's more than a fluke, it's so out of the norm that it's off the chart of anomalous weather patterns. But his only thoughts on the unnatural snowstorm are that it almost killed Stiles.

 

“I know you're there...”

 

Stiles' voice makes Derek startle, because he hadn't even registered the slight uptick of his waking heartbeat, granted, the boy still sounds severely sleep-groggy.

 

“Go back to sleep, Stiles...”

 

“Well, you stop creepering and maybe I will.”

 

“I'm not ---”

 

“Yes, yes you are.”

 

Derek can see Stiles in the dark, still laying down on the bed, snuggled into his blanket, head turned Derek's way even when his human eyes can't see him. Derek sighs.

 

“Go back to sleep,” he tells Stiles, turning around to leave. Because he should, he really, really should. Go. Before he does something stupid like actually climb on the bed with Stiles and snuggle him. And he did not just think about snuggling.

 

“How many feet of snow are there?” Stiles counters with and Derek groans.

 

Of course Stiles won't just go to sleep when told to, who was he even trying to kid when he'd spoken the words? He answers anyway because he has no reason not to.

 

“It's eight feet now. It isn't natural, this much snow.”

 

“Tell me about it,” Stiles intones and sighs deep, “I've convinced myself it's been sent here to Beacon Hills to try and kill me. Because my doctor's can't seem to figure out why I seemed like I'd been buried in the snow for almost a whole day or something, when it was only a shortish while until you found me.”

 

And Derek turns back on his heel, facing the bed again. Because it's unacceptable, really it is, that someone should be after Stiles.

 

“Well find out what it is,” he tells Stiles. And with that, he finally lets go of a small bit of his resistance.

 


	7. Wearing Your Skin to School

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles isn't all there. (See notes at the end!)

_"Do you want to become a demon too?"_

 

The reason for the snow-storm was not what either Stiles or Derek had expected. Because, really, who ever expects demons?

 

Stiles hadn't, he knew he hadn't. Okay, sure, he _had_ read about them, but had never really thought that they would ever see one. Because that, that was another kettle of fish entirely, because Stiles had never thought of demons as anything other than religious creatures, not as being part of the supernatural. He hadn't believed that they were actually a thing that existed.

 

Maybe he should have. Maybe he really, really should have. Because now he was very knowledgeable and utterly convinced over their existence.

 

Stiles just wished it was by any other means than by having one possessing his body. The thing had tried to, had wanted to possess his body after he'd left by _dying_ it but had become impatient after it's “let's have it snow like never before in Beacon Hills so Stiles Stilinski freezes to death and I can possess his dead cold corpse” plan had backfired. Or so much Stiles assumed, as the demon never said anything about it outright.

 

And now the demon wanted to _kill_ Derek because Derek had saved Stiles life and thus put a wrench in it's plans.

 

The thought of Derek dying was terrifying. Even more so when the demon made it perfectly crystal clear to Stiles that Derek would die by his hands, that Stiles' hands would be soaked in Derek's blood and Derek would think that it was Stiles killing him.

 

Stiles didn't want Derek to die. And the rest, of being there and seeing it all and feeling Derek die because of what his body was doing, even when he wasn't himself in control of it... it made Stiles feel sick.

 

But he didn't know enough to try and kick the demon out of his body. Why the thing would even want to posses his 147 pounds of fragile skin and bones, Stiles had no idea. He kicked and screamed as the demon wore his skin, walked in his shoes and just had a riot in his body. It was terrifying. Mostly since the demon kept telling him about all the things that it wanted to do, what he would do. Like injuring Stiles' body so that, even if the demon was exorcised, Stiles would die. And that... that filled Stiles which dread, utter unadulterated dread right down to his bones, slinking around his thoughts where he's stuffed into a corner of his mind while the demon runs the show.

 

But not as much as the demon's plans of killing Derek and making him watch.

 

* * *

 

The demon walks Stiles' body out of the hospital, after having slunk in when Derek had left before being caught by a nurse. Stiles had fallen asleep when Derek had left and then, then he had been walking but had had no control over his limbs. He had tried to scream but no voice had come out. He had tried to move his body, stop his legs from walking, move his arms, anything. Nothing had happened. Then he had heard the voice, slick and amused, filling his head, slithering against his own thoughts, now trapped in his head.

_'You can't do anything, you know.'_

 

 _The hell?_ Stiles is astonished that the thought, that his inner voice, succeeds in sounding panicked. This is not happening. It isn't.

 

 _'It is, kid. Just sit back for the ride.'_ The voice, someone else _inside his fucking head_ , tells him. The other is making his body run along the hospital corridors and out the doors before Stiles can recover from the shock.

 

_THE HELL IS GOING ON? WHO THE HELL ARE YOU? GET OUT OF MY HEAD, GET OUT OF MY HEAD GET OUT OF MY HEAD!_

 

Stiles is yelling at the other presence in his head, the one that has taken over his actions, pressing him away from the controls and fucking _using him_ , hoping against all hope that it'll make a difference. Even when he has little hope, and isn't that just a depressing thought, he has to do something because he's isn't just gonna sit back and watch and hope that someone will help him out of this situation.

 

_'Hell is the operative word, boy. Welcome to your own personal version of it. I'm so gonna enjoy fucking up your life and watch as it all burns.'_

_* * *_

 

The word demon whirls around in Stiles head after that, even when the demon, whose thoughts Stiles can't decipher, can't “hear” unless the demon “talks” to him. And _personal hell_ is just what comes after. By the time it's done, when the demon has had it's night's fill of hurting the people Stiles loves, Stiles kinda wishes that he was dead, because even if, by some miracle, the demon was exorcised, Stiles doesn't know how he would ever be able pick up the pieces of his life, after.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is where this fic began to merge with Supernatural. As in there are demons who possess people. Yay. And Stiles isn't happy over being possessed. This is my first cross-over of TW/SPN so bear with me. No real knowledge of SPN is really required, even when some character from SPN will appear in this fic.


	8. The Absolute Worst

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The demon wears Stiles skin to school, verbally abuses his friends and then goes back home... where his dad is, worried sick over Stiles' disappearance from the hospital.

  
_"People get too used to inconvenience."_

WARNINGS: canon-typical violence, emotional anguish

 

The worst of it is, Stiles thinks, that not all the people he knows notice something is wrong with him right away when they see him. He hopes that it's just because the demon starts easy. Hurtful words, verbal barbs which hit the mark every single time since what Stiles knows will hurt, the demon knows too. They dig in deep and Stiles can't take the words back, can't tell that he doesn't mean it, would never lay such hurt on anyone willingly.

 

Because his words aren't his own anymore.

 

Lydia is the one who stares at him like she can't believe that _Stiles_ has the _gall_ to use such words, call her such names, prod at the hurts she's being so careful to hide, that she has hidden under her haughty exterior. She, to her credit, gives back in equal measure, heaping over him all of what she thinks is wrong about him. But when she rushes off, her stilettos clicking on the floor, she does turn back, gives him a look.

 

It's frightening how easy it is for the demon to just slink Stiles' body to class, brush off Scott when his best friend rushes at him´and demands to know why he isn't in the hospital. It hurts and feels nice that Scott is so worried, even when they have drifted a bit apart in the wake of all the supernatural. Hurts more when the demon spouts abuse at Scott and his face just crumbles.

 

And then his body is running, the demon jerking him away because of the way Scott had suddenly sniffed at him and had...

 

It's good to know that Scott must have sensed that something was wrong. On his way out Stiles runs into Isaac, Boyd and Erica, abuses them and leaves them behind as quick as that.

 

He feels bad. He feels so bad about it all. But the worst really is that none of them notice it off the bat, not before he opens his mouth, and not instantly after that either. It doesn't help that the demon keeps talking to him inside his head, taunting him, telling him that his friends are no real friends, after all.

 

It gets Stiles wondering. About if he normally really acts in a way that would lend credence to the people in his life to believe it when his personality takes a swift turn from sarcastic to hurting people with words on purpose and _enjoying it._

 

The worst, the absolute worst, is his dad.

 

The demon drags him home even when Stiles fights him for control with all the strength he can muster which, in the end, doesn't seem to be near enough at all. His dad is home, slumped on the kitchen table with his face in his hands as the demon walks Stiles through the front door and the living room into the kitchen.

 

His dad takes one look at him and doesn't seem to notice much of anything. Just starts talking as he gets up and walks up to Stiles. “Where the hell have you been?! You walked out of the hospital! I've been worried sick!”

 

Then he goes to hug Stiles and Stiles screams internally because he wants to hug him back but the demon, in control, doesn't let him but is stiff in the hug and the look on his dad's face fucking hurts.

 

“Stiles?” His dad asks and Stiles knows that he knows that something's wrong.

 

“I'm fine,” the demon makes Stiles' lips say, making them snarl up into a sneer, “fuck, don't fuss so much!” The body, his but now not his as he's not in control, twists out of his dad's grasp and backs off.

 

His dad just looks at him, floored and Stiles begs that he notices something. Yes, he had been lying to his dad about the werewolves, first for protection and then almost out of habit even when it had grated at him, the way his dad had looked at him, both of them knowing that more lies than truths ever made it out of Stiles' mouth.

 

“I don't need you.” The demon says and his dad's face just crumples.

 

Then it sets and Stiles knows that look. And he hopes it's not getting his dad into trouble. The demon has filled his head with vivid, graphic images of all the things it's capable of doing even when it inhabits a human body. Stiles really doesn't want any of them happening to his dad. He really doesn't.

 

Stiles wants control over his body so hard it hurts, even when it maybe shouldn't, since he doesn't think he has control over parts of his body which can hurt, even when it's emotional anguish but... yeah, maybe he feels it's more viscerally now that all the accompanying physical responses are cut out. Because the demon wearing his skin doesn't feel anguish. He feel, and it filters over to Stiles, glee. The demon is hyped by the idea that he gets to wrench all these broken sad faces and responses out of his dad, more so when it _knows_ how Stiles reacts to them. It's a vicious feed-back loop even when Stiles can't loop out.

 

Then the demon says things to Stiles' dad which he _has_ to block out but he can't block out the face his dad has, a face which makes Stiles want to break free, claw his way out and shove the demon out, to tell his dad that it's not him talking, that he doesn't mean it, that he would _never_ say such things.

 

Even when his dad says: “That's not my son. Stiles would never say anything like that to me. Who the fuck are you?”

 

The words don't wipe away the look of utter bone-deep hurt that still sits on his dad's face like it's going to stay there for the rest of his life. Stiles can't even begin to fathom how unsettling it must be to hear such words spoken in a voice belonging to someone you love even when you know by the content that it can't be the person whose it is saying them.

 

Not surprisingly, the demon rages. Even when it's had access to Stiles' memories, knows about how much he loves his dad, would die for him in a heartbeat, _it_ had _actually_ believed that his dad would believe it was his son spouting hurtful lies to him.

 

His dad looks weary and then Stiles sees what the demon sees through a glaze of black shadows and he freaks, he honestly freaks out. His dad does too, there's a look of absolute bonewrenching horror on his face and Stiles knows he'll remember that look until his very last breath. Which may come sooner rather than later by the way things are going.

 

There's a scuffle which leaves his dad down on their kitchen floor, blood pooling under him, the demon racing Stiles' body out of there even when Stiles wills it to _fucking stay put_. Because his hands have his dad's blood on them, his hands held a knife and he's seen his dad's face when _his own fucking hands twist a knife in his gut._ Stiles can only hope for the best, taking small comfort in that the demon wants his dad to die slow, so the wound isn't lethal... not yet. Not if his dad gets help, sooner rather than later.

 

Then Stiles is having a panic attack, thinking about his dad all alone, in pain and with the images of _Stiles_ stabbing him, and _that_ actually makes the demon stumble. Lose control. Drop to the floor. And now Stiles' vision is swimming with another kind of blackness as he's fighting his body, fighting the demon for control even when he's forgotten how to breathe, even when he shakes and can't think of nothing but how cold his dad's blood feels on his fingers.

 

Stiles crawls over towards his dad, and it's so fucking _hard_ to do. The demon is still not in control but not for a lack of trying and Stiles can still feel it, fuck how he _can,_ how it gnaws to get back to control. Back in control to _hurt his dad._

 

His reaching for his dad but it's still too damn far, his dad is few feet away and it feels like it's the other side of the world. Stiles cannot breathe, cannot but replay the last few seconds in his mind as he reels.

 

“Dad...” Stiles croaks out, his jaw clenching on the words as the demon inside fights for control. His dad's blood is sticky on his fingers and he wants to be sick. _Is_ sick, heaving up bile as his body shudders and he can't breathe, cheek against the kitchen floor, his dad way too far away.

 

“Stiles...” His dad's voice absolutely breaks Stiles' heart. It's hopeful. Broken. Sad. Tired. If Stiles tries, surely he can reach, his fingers are stretching, eyes locked with his dad's where he lies on face-down on the floor but his head craned towards Stiles. Just a little bit...

 

Then the demon slams back in control and everything shifts, the demon picking his body up the floor in an inhuman way, like he's a puppet on strings.

 

“How foes it feel to be killed by your own son?” It asks his dad, making Stiles want to bite his own tongue so he can drown in his blood and be unable to speak. The demon just laughs inside his head. And it just fucking goes on. “Was it as good for you as it was for me?” it fucking _purrs_ as it leans closer, so close that Stiles can feel his dad's breath hot on his cheek.

 

“But now I feel _so_ bad,” it continues, mock-contrite, “might have to kill myself.” The demon plays with the knife, brings it close to Stiles' face, his dad's face so his dad can't _not_ see it.

 

“May need to stab this in and add my blood to yours.”


	9. Doomed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles faces his own mortality.

  
_"Get your epitaph right."_  
 

It hurts. What happened in his kitchen. Everything. But the pain which the demon makes him feel, forces him to feel, the reason of it, the knowing that there will be no going back now, that even if the demon wouldn't be... Even that doesn't scare Stiles as much as the image of his dad lying on the floor, sprawled there and the blood, the feel of his dad's blood on his fingers, the anguish in his dad's voice when his dad had looked at him, after... It broke Stiles.

 

Because Stiles knew that there was no going back to what had been before. The demon had destroyed that. Had taken away what he'd had with his dad. Had taken away trust, had trampled on the relationship he and his dad had. Because Stiles knew that his dad would never be able to look at him the same way that he had before, would never be able to _not_ remember that it had been his son's hands around the knife, that it had been his son who had stabbed him, leaned close and stabbed him and left him bleeding on their kitchen floor.

 

His dad would remember that, even if Stiles knew that his dad had known that it hadn't been him, just someone else making his son's body move and do what couldn't be unmade, what had broken something between Stiles and his dad that could never be rebuilt. That could never be entirely fixed. Because no amount of drinking could erase that memory from his dad's head. No words of explanation could ever repair the damage the demon had inflicted while wearing Stiles' body, forcing him to watch while it hurt his dad, both physically and mentally.

 

And Stiles ached because he was pretty sure that he wouldn't be there to see his dad get through it.

 

Not because Stiles thought that his dad would die of the wound which had been made with a slow agonizing death in mind. No, his dad would survive it. He _had_ to. Stiles had to believe it. It had to be his focus because if it wasn't then the demon would have won. It already has, when it stabbed Stiles in it's fury, but maybe that was Stiles' win because the demon can't leave him now to live with the remains of what used to be his life.

 

For the moment the demon leaves his body behind, Stiles will die.

 

He will bleed to death and there will be no saving him, not even if the demon decided to dump him in a hospital when it slithered out. Stiles knows it because the demon knows it. Can feel it rattling in his head, triumphant and aggravated all in one go. Sure, the demon will make Stiles suffer before it goes, before it leaves behind his body that has no chance of being whole after it does, it'll make him suffer and destroy everything Stiles loves.

 

Stiles is already dead and the demon is just making his body walk, keeping his self tethered to his body when it would normally be gone. If the demon wasn't still inside, fucking with him, Stiles would be just a cold lifeless corpse. Instead of that, though, the demon is making his body work even when it's broken, keeping it moving, on the brink, keeping it alive, arresting the wound from bleeding.

 

The demon runs his body through the town and into the preserve, into Hale territory. Of course. It wants to fuck with Derek too, and not the normal sexy fucking although... and that makes Stiles sick. Because there are some very vivid images in his mind now, things that the demon wants to do to Derek. Things it wants to take from Derek. Dignity. Trust. Self-worth. It wants to trample boundaries, violate Derek. Make Derek hate him, look at him and hate him. Make Stiles watch. Those thoughts swirl from the demon to Stiles and replace those of his dad, even when Stiles thinks that it's impossible that the demon could even do them, because Derek is stronger than him. Always has been.

 

But even if Stiles is already dead, even when his name is as good as hacked into stone, Stiles will not go down without a fight. He'll take the demon with him if he can. It laughs at that, because it knows that he can't but Stiles swears he'll find a way to do just that, because it's all he can do, the last thing he'll try to do before he dies. Then, just then, when the demon and Stiles are standing on the edge of the preserve where the ground suddenly turns into a cliff and looks down at Beacon Hills, Stiles hears the last voice which he wants to hear now.

 

“Stiles?”


	10. Not Lethal, But

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Derek tracks Stiles' scent and finds the sheriff at the Stilinski house.

_"A side parade, with a single balloon"_

 

 

Derek is frantic.

 

He feels so dislodged that it's an actual physical ache. Stiles is _missing_. He disappeared from the hospital during the night. Slipped past Derek somehow while he was keeping guard. Derek would never forgive himself for that lapse. Because something is clearly wrong and he's not in the center of it, Stiles is.

 

That frightens Derek the most. He calls everyone but no-one's seen Stiles. The pack decided to go to school, after Derek had nagged at them, at least for a few hours in the hopes that Stiles turns up. The sheriff is wrangling his staff for a thorough search he hears from Scott, which Derek observes from the sidelines because with that, he can't interfere, nor would. The sheriff has arrested him before, after all. Even if Derek brought Stiles to the hospital, he can't bring himself to hope that the sheriff isn't suspicious of him, despite their tenuous cordiality.

 

The events, how Stiles has been targeted leave a bitter taste in Derek's mouth.

 

Even more so when his pack starts to update on him about seeing Stiles. They tell him he hadn't seemed to be himself, that he had been behaving out of character. Way out of character. Like something is controlling Stiles. But he had seemed ok to the outside, even when Derek's beta's told him that they'd caught a whiff of... something else they can't wrap their noses around.

 

It's all coming to a head as Derek tracks Stiles scent to his house. And it is mixed with sulfur, of all things. Derek decides that it cannot be good, not good at all.

 

He crashes in through the front door, not thinking at all, the sickly sweet scent of blood assaulting his senses the moment he crosses the threshold. And he knows that scent, knows that blood and doesn't think at all but runs into the kitchen with werewolf speed not checking the impulse. Because it isn't Stiles' blood, which he realizes as soon as he enters the kitchen.

 

It's good that the sheriff knows, otherwise Derek crashing into his kitchen wolfed out would have given him a heart-attack on top of the injuries he already has.

 

Derek drops to the floor beside the sheriff, sees the wound and curses. It's not lethal... yet, but he thinks that there is too much blood anyway, too much blood for a human to loose. And he doesn't like the way the sheriff's eyes look, unfocused, dazed. Losing focus. His hand immediately lands on the sheriffs arm and starts to leech out the pain.

 

“Stiles...” the sheriff rasps out, blood gurgling in his throat as Derek's flipping out his cell to call for an ambulance.

 

Derek turns to look at him, frowning, the call forgotten, his finger slack on the call button.

 

“He was here?” He asks the sheriff, trying to bite back the growl, he'd shifted back when he'd seen the sheriff wounded and lying on the floor, but his control is snapping again now. He wills himself to calm, to not have his claws come out where his hand is on the sheriff's arm.

 

“It was and wasn't Stiles. His eyes were... they were black. All black.” The sheriff takes time to get the words out but not because he doesn't seem to want to not say them, but because he's having trouble to breathe.

 

And that makes Derek hit call and tell the paramedics to hurry. As much as he wants to leave right after the call, Derek also knows he can't leave Stiles' father like this. Not before the paramedics come. Despite how much he wants to run and find Stiles.

 

“Who did this?” He asks as he tries to help the sheriff into a more comfortable position, pressing a towel to the wound, to stem the sluggish blood flow. He can't process the information. All black eyes? Stiles and not Stiles? It doesn't make any sense.

 

The sheriff grasps at his arm with his bloodied fingers. And the look on his face is horrified as Derek looks down at him.

 

“Who did this?” Derek asks again. His mind is counting the minutes, thinking how fucking long the ambulance will take. He doesn't like the way the sheriff's breath gurgles. The blood scent assaults his nostrils, smelling like Stiles but not quite and yet... there it is. Stiles' blood. His eyes zero in on the knife, and ordinary cutting knife, with blood on the blade lying discarded on the linoleum a few feet away.

 

The sheriff's face drops before the words come out of his mouth. Words Derek never wanted to hear, never expected. “It was... but it wasn't him. It was not my son. It wasn't Stiles.”

 

Even when he doesn't want to ask, Derek needs to clarify things. “Stiles did this?”

 

“It wasn't my son! It was his body, maybe, but it wasn't him!” And then, after having yelled the words out the sheriff gasps, coughs and spits out blood.

 

And Derek. Derek feels cold. There's a vice around his heart, squeezing, squeezing so hard that he feels like he's choking with it. He has no idea what the hell has happened to Stiles. But he has to believe that what the sheriff says is true. Stiles would never try and kill his own father. Never. Not when he's in his right mind. Not even then, Derek thinks, Stiles would have to be hallucinating and thinking that his dad was someone else to be able to hurt him.

 

The sheriff is gripping at him again, his heart beating erratic in Derek's ears, shaking him out of his thoughts. “You have to find him. Stiles. He's hurt.”

 

“What did he do?” Derek asks, dreading the answer. His ears finally pick up the sirens in the distance. “The ambulance will be here soon,” he tells the sheriff to reassure... he doesn't actually know which of them.

 

The thought of something controlling Stiles is the only thing keeping Derek from shifting, from throwing his head back and howling. Once the sheriff is being taken care of, Derek will call the pack, even when it's still the middle of the school day and track down Stiles.

 

“He... it was Stiles' voice but, it wasn't Stiles using it, his body. It made Stiles stab himself in the heart.”

 

Those words make Derek's world fall apart.


	11. This Isn't You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The instant Derek sees Stiles in the woods he knows something isn't right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I actually only realized after I'd posted this to the LJ comm that I'd snatched the title from the season 3B trailer... but as this fic is kinda inspired by the 3B promo things and the theme of losing one's mind...

 

_"Sometimes they are, and sometimes they aren't."_

 

 

The closer Derek gets to Stiles the more wrong the boy's scent becomes. It's still Stiles but mixed, sulfur clinging to the woodsy intoxicating boy-smell, making it cloying and not sweet as it should have been, as it had always been to Derek's nose. It was all mixed with the sickly sweet scent of Stiles' blood. It's also too easy to pick up even with the icy snow smell, the smell of an unnatural snowfall.

 

The snow itself doesn't hinder Derek, even when it's deep. It's actually less so in the forest, where the trees had prevented from the trails to be buried in it. And even if he didn't have the scent to track by, Stiles' deep foot steps in the snow would tell him all he needs to know.

 

Derek didn't find any blood as he tracked, even when the scent trailed in the air. There had just been those few droplets on the kitchen knife back at the Stilinski house.

 

“ _It was... but it wasn't him. It was not my son. It wasn't Stiles.”_

 

The sheriff's pained words clank around inside Derek's head and he can't fathom them out. As he tracks, Derek phones Deaton. Tells him about the all black eyes and the way Stiles scent is mixed with sulfur. There is a long pause after that, during which Derek makes himself concentrate on the scent, shuddering as it leads him to the preserve, towards his lands. The Hale property. Then Deaton speaks, tells Derek that he'll have to check some books, make some phone calls. Tells Derek that he knows just the people to contact.

 

“But how can Stiles be okay when he's mortally wounded?”

 

Those are Derek's last words before the call ends. And Deaton has no answer. Derek stuffs the thought away the same he does his cell into his jacket pocket. He spares a thought to think if the sheriff is already at the hospital. Hopes that the sheriff will survive, because of Stiles.

 

Derek cannot think that Stiles won't make it through this. The boy always makes through everything. Absolutely everything. Then the scent of him is invading Derek senses and he comes to a halt, sees Stiles standing on the edge of the cliff, looking down at the city below. He's only wearing jeans and no jacket, just a plaid flannel. Derek's already shrugging out of his jacket at the sight, moving his cell to his pocket as he approaches.

 

“Stiles?” He asks. The noise makes the boy whip around and Derek's blood freezes. He can clearly see the stab wound, right over Stiles' heart, the crimson blood, not much but enough, staining the few layers of clothing over it. That alone is eerie. Stiles is only wearing a tee and a flannel shirt over it and isn't shivering at all and Derek's ears can't pick up an elevated heartbeat which would accompany being cold. But he can smell the smoky scent of _death_ lingering over Stiles body. Mixed with Stiles' own scent, which is overpowered by the reek of sulfur.

 

His hands falter and the leather jacket drops to the snow, forgotten.

 

“You know...” Stiles says, well, Stiles body says and Derek has no idea how he knows that, he just does. He doesn't need to see the eyes being all black, not a hint of warm whiskey in them, just all black, not just the pupils. Maybe it's because Derek knows that Stiles is mortally wounded, being human, he shouldn't even be able to stand right now.

 

Stiles should be dead and yet there he is, walking and talking. Coming to Derek and crowding him in against a tree, mimicking what Derek usually does to the boy.

 

It is both wrong and right, wrong because Derek has no fucking idea what the hell is going on, right because this is something Derek might have wanted... if Stiles had been in his right mind and not... whatever hell he is. All Derek knows is that the body crowding into his, pressing against him, isn't in Stiles' control.

 

The sulfur is overbearing this close up and makes Derek want to sneeze, which he doesn't, of course. Even if he wants to. The death scent is making his hackles rise. Because how can Stiles still be standing with the scent of it so strong? But what the hell do the black eyes mean anyway.

 

“This isn't you.” He says, careful not to reach out and touch Stiles. Because the boy feels _wrong_. And yet, Stiles is still there, buried, shoved aside, somewhere deep. Derek has to believe it, has to think that it must be so otherwise all is lost. “What...”

 

Stiles leans against him, pressing his body very very close and leans against his neck. Derek can't find it in himself to move an inch. Because it's too much. Even if Stiles smells like death Derek can't make himself turn away.

 

“I'm just me.” Stiles voice states, the words spoken against the sensitive skin of Derek's neck, making him shiver involuntarily. Stiles' voice sounds wrong, even when it sort of doesn't. Nothing about Stiles feels right at the moment. “Derek...”

 

That finally makes Derek react. He reaches out and catches Stiles by the arms, forces him farther away and looks into his face, hoping to see Stiles looking back at him from the boys face, hoping for the black eyes to have gone away.

 

“I was at your house... Stiles.” Derek says. “I called an ambulance for your father because he was bleeding on your kitchen floor.”

 

And there is nothing. No flood of emotion on the boys face, no uptick of his heart, no drawn in breath to show that the words affect Stiles in any possible way. No words come to respond his. That in itself is worrying. Because Stiles is never quiet, Derek thinks that it's against his genetic makeup to not talk as much, sometimes even more, as humanly possible.

 

The boy in Derek's grip – whom he refuses to call Stiles in his head because even when it's Stiles body, Stiles isn't the one in control, and Derek had thought that they were over and done with people being controlled by others – looks at Derek for a long time, shakes his head and the black eyes shift back to Stiles normal whiskey-cinnamon shade.

 

“I didn't mean for that to happen,” the words come out, without inflection, sounding meaningless, there is no real emotion behind them, “or maybe I did, can't say.”

 

“What are you?” Derek asks, horrified, scared for Stiles because this isn't the boy he kissed yesterday, the boy he dragged up from a snowdrift. What ran off from Beacon Hills hospital wasn't Stiles, but something making his body move without his control. Derek just needs to figure out what it is so he can help Stiles. Maybe the cocky bastard will slip if Derek asks straight, he thinks.

 

“I'm Stiles,” comes the answer from Stiles' mouth, in his voice and for a moment Derek falters. Until he's drenched in the death smell again. And that is wrong. It makes Derek want to shift, grab Stiles and drag him to Deaton's and lock him up until they find a solution to help him.

 

“No you're really not. Don't smell right at all.”

 

Then the other body is pressed against him again even as he struggles. But Derek doesn't put all his strength into it because he's afraid of hurting Stiles if he's too rough. The pale skin bruises all too easy. It is still Stiles' body, even when all of it is wrong.

 

“Why don't you make me smell like you?” The words purr against his skin. “Or maybe if I'll make you?” Just as easily as the words come the boy pushes and shoves Derek down and settles over his body. “Because I can, you know. And I know you like it...”


	12. You'd Let Me Do Anything, Wouldn't You?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles has never wanted Derek to kiss him less. (See Notes for warnings for the chapter!)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: chapter contains kissing and touching related dub-con because of the demonic possession. 
> 
> This was the hardest chapter to write and I'm so glad I decided to go another way with this. Also, this AO3 version is now caught up with what I've been posting to my tumblr.

_"Empty your heart of its mortal dream."_

 

 _You can't do this._ Stiles is fighting so hard. Fighting for control. Fighting for Derek. Derek who knows that he isn't him right now, that this isn't him in control. It's just Stiles body and the demon at the wheel, even if Derek doesn't necessarily know it's a demon. But he knows that something is wrong and it's enough for Stiles.

 

Because he can't have Derek think that it's him saying all these things. Doing all these things. Even when pressing against Derek isn't a hardship, not at all. Even when it's dangerous now, with everything that the demon wants to do to Derek. With Derek.

 

Stiles would give anything to kick out the demon now, if he could, even if he would bleed to death the moment he did. That the demon is having his body run around in freezing cold with too little layers on, with a knife wound to his heart isn't helping keep his body viable. Stiles doesn't want to give in, but he knows that he won't survive this. All he can try and do is keep the demon from hurting the people he loves, not that he's managed that all that well, and take the demon with him as his body gives in. If only he knew how to do that properly, so that the demon would stay dead.

 

The demon, of course, hasn't told him if it can even be killed by any mortal means.

 

 _'You'll never be able to get rid of me, you know?'_ The demon crows inside Stiles' head, making him feel even more trapped than before. _'Not until I've finished with your body. You'll never be in control of it again. The last thing you'll ever feel is dying. Choking on your own blood when your life is ashes.'_

 

Stiles just wants to survive this. Survive this and make things okay with his dad, see him recover. Tell him he loves him and that he's sorry, sorry for not being strong enough to prevent the demon from hurting his dad, for stabbing him. Apologize to his friends for the words he's said. Fall into Derek's arms and make him see why they're better together than apart.

 

Stiles can feel his fingers pressing against Derek's skin, can feel the full-body contact that they have and, if everything was different, it would be perfect to be like this. But because of the demon everything is wrong.

 

“You'd let me do anything, Derek, wouldn't you?” He hears his own voice say.

 

“If you were Stiles, yes.” Derek replies and it's... kind of like a kick in the gut. Because of course, when someone else is in control of Stiles body only then does the Sourwolf decide that maybe he and Stiles can have a thing. Only then does he give in. When Stiles is all but gone already. And maybe that's it. Maybe Derek can only say those things when he knows that they won't ever happen, because Stiles will die before anything can.

 

“But I am,” the demon purrs with it's borrowed voice, “I am Stiles in here. All Stiles and a little something. And I _can_ make you do anything I want.” And the demon does, slipping Stiles icy fingers under Derek's shirt, making the werewolf shiver. Stiles hates himself that he likes it, the feel of Derek's skin under his fingertips. And then there's a strong grip around his wrists, wrenching them away.

 

The demon growls out, a sound which is unlike anything that's come out of Stiles' mouth. It shakes Derek off easily enough, slaps him on the face hard enough to make something in Stiles hand break, as the angle is all wrong. It hurts and Stiles wonders if the demon feels it, or if it's just him. He thinks that it doesn't feel the pain of his body, otherwise it would be difficult for it to walk around with the wound, even if Stiles doesn't feel that either.

 

Derek flips them over and the demon lets him.

 

Stiles hates him for it. Derek knows it's not him and yet... why is he giving in? Derek kisses his body and Stiles doesn't feel that, the demon blocks that out with a manic cackle. Stiles is cut off from his senses other than sight and sound. Everything else is like a broken connection. He knows that he should feel Derek's lips on his own, the weight of his body over his own, the hands laid carefully across his torso.

 

It shouldn't feel this bad to have Derek kissing him but it does.

 

Because it's everything Stiles wants and at the same time the exact opposite. Derek shouldn't be touching him, kissing him, when he's like this, when he isn't _himself_ inside his skin. When he can't feel, can't kiss Derek back. Tell him that he loves him. Ask him to take care of his dad. Plead him to save his life. To not even fake to trust the demon controlling his body. Stiles wants to scream at Derek, kick him and bite his lip. He wants what he's never before wanted, for Derek to stop kissing him.

 

And it's so wrong. Feels like betrayal. Like Derek doesn't care who's inside Stiles body as long as he gets to touch it. It's throwing the demon off the loop too, since it thought that it would have to force Derek into this, touching, being false-intimate, wrong-intimate. Into bucking their hips together, kissing, too much kissing when Stiles _can't_ feel.

 

It's the finest sort of torture, Stiles thinks, more elaborate and hurtful than what Stiles would have thought the demon being able to concoct. Because Derek is responding even when he knows. But then there is what's now the sweetest sound to Stiles' ears... the swiftly nearing howling of wolves.


	13. Kissing You to Save Your Life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Derek is kissing Stiles to keep whatever is controlling him occupied until the pack comes. And he hates that he has to do it.

  
_"I savor bitterness--it is born of experience."_   


 

Derek knew, or thought he knew, what Stiles, who had to be in there somewhere, trapped within that body that smelled both right and wrong, must be thinking when he kissed the boy. He wasn't sure what it was that had taken over Stiles body and his will, but it was nothing new after the kanima and Peter's mind control of Lydia.

 

How he wished that he knew. That he could be sure that Stiles still was somewhere under there, under the words which sounded wrong despite the voice that said them, despite everything.

 

But he needs to distract the thing controlling Stiles so he does, in the only way he can, because he'll be damned before he damages Stiles body any more. He makes himself do it, despite the wound on Stiles' chest, despite the overpowering scent of death lingering on Stiles' lips, mixed with sulfur and the boy smell of Stiles. Scared, Stiles smells scared, this close Derek can pick up the scent from the mix of others. He pins the boys body down when he picks up another scent, feels that pack is near.

 

His pack.

 

Which means that he needs even more distraction. Derek's brain runs a mile a minute, in awe that Deaton was so quick to find something, or then his beta's are just acting on their own. Derek has to think that Deaton's figures something out, he just has to. Otherwise... he has no idea how long he can detain this thing controlling Stiles' body, keeping him on the brink of death.

 

That, Derek has to make himself not think about that. But he knows, oh, how he knows. How broken the boys body is. How he should be dead but isn't. How something supernatural is keeping death at bay, keeping his body functioning despite the fatal wound. He just hopes that he can distract this _thing_ which has stolen Stiles and then save him. Because there is no other choice. Despite what Derek said to Stiles only yesterday, what seems years ago now, he isn't able to let Stiles go, to live on without him. He's not able to hold back, even when he knows that Stiles is trapped and is probably taking the kissing as betrayal.

 

But if it's a betrayal that will help with sorting the situation out, Derek will do it. He will do it even when it's leaving a bitter taste in his mouth, even when he feels like he's taking advantage of Stiles. He kisses him like it's the hardest thing he's ever done in his life.

 

And it is.

 

Then he's filled with the presence of _pack_ and wrenches his lips from Stiles'. Stiles, who is staring up at him, eyes wide and full of tears, heart hammering a mile a minute, body shuddering as his body was struggling to draw in much needed air.

 

“Demon...” the boy said and Derek _knew_ it was Stiles, not that could explain why. Maybe it was the panic attack, the desperate way Stiles clung to him, the way he was struggling to get the words out, the sharp all-encompassing scent of pain, the way Stiles voice shuddered on the edge of it. The way he screamed at the same time the smell of his blood filled Derek's nostrils. As Stiles was choking on it, crimson blossoming on his lips. “It's... cover... mouth... or I'll...”

 

The change was swift, palpable and left Derek reeling.

 

Both emotionally and physically, as the moment Stiles control was gone, his body bucked under Derek and whomever it was who was in control of it sent Derek flying through the air, using force Derek knew all too well Stiles human body didn't have.

 

There was snarling around them in the snowy forest and Scott, Isaac, Boyd and Erica came into view, all yelling.

 

“Stiles!” “He's wounded!” “What did you do?” “What's that scent?” Were all uttered by them all at once as they circled Derek and Stiles.

 

Derek was shocked, half-buried in the snow, his senses still reeling by all he'd gotten from Stiles in the space of less than a minute. All laid over by the death scent and the blood, the scent of which was overpowering now. The stain of it had spread over Stiles' tee and Derek felt sick wondering how much more his body could take. How much of his time the panic attack, which had apparently jolted Stiles back into control momentarily.

 

 _Demon_.

 

The word echoed inside Derek's head. He couldn't believe it. Demons couldn't be real. Well, they always had the worst of luck and ran into the most improbable supernatural beings. But why would one possess Stiles? Cover his mouth, Stiles had said before losing control again.

 

“It's a demon,” Derek spat out as he sprang up, already running towards Stiles. He had to try and contain him somehow. “Said to cover his mouth, otherwise...”

 

Scott was speeding by him, flanked by Isaac as Boyd and Erica ran to intercept Stiles by the edge of the cliff. “Yeah, that's what Deaton said. He called a hunter!”

 

Derek bit back his retort as they ran to corner Stiles, well, the demon who was possessing him and was apparently doing it's damnedest to emotionally scar him until it would leave his broken dying body behind.

 

“It's strong but Stiles...” Derek growled as they were closer to Stiles, “he's...” He knew he would need to get the words out, that he had to, but they stuck in the back of his throat. The others would smell it anyway. Had. If the sadness wafting from them was any indicator.

 

It was the demon's undoing that it was facing Derek, Isaac and Scott, because Erica slipped behind the boy and distracted him. Well, the demon threw her against a tree but it gave Derek and Scott the window to push Stiles down and cover his mouth so the demon couldn't escape.

 

Stiles body struggled under them as Derek gagged his mouth with strips of cloth ripped from his tee, with Scott's scarf over it.

 

Now all they had to do was get Stiles to Deaton's and hope for the best.


	14. Devil's Trap

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Options on how to keep Stiles alive once the demon is gone are discussed.

_"A body needs a good memento mori to flush out the humors."_

 

Stiles thought that he wouldn't have minded dying if the last thing he did was feel Derek's lips on his own, kissing him. As he hadn't, he did mind, a lot. The panic attack he'd had when Derek had kissed him, even if he had heard the pack howling near, has jolted Stiles back into control again. And it had made the Demon more angrier than ever.

 

It was good that Derek had covered his mouth, because the demon had been ready to bolt after Erica had jumped him.

 

The pain from the slip of the demon's control still lingered. Stiles had been dying for that near minute he'd been in control of his body, his words. The wound hadn't been in stasis and he had felt every bit of it, had felt his heart beating, had felt the blood flowing.

 

Derek's carrying him. Stiles can feel his arms holding his body, his extremities kept tight to his body. It was only because of Derek's werewolf strength that his body with the demon's power sizzling under the skin could be contained. Well, the holy water which Scott had thrown all over his face, making his fucking _skin_ smolder and break had done it's job to weaken the demon.

 

Stiles wasn't really able to concentrate on the conversation around him as Derek and the pack ran.

 

There was so much he would have wanted to ask, had he had control over his mouth, if it had not been gagged. Most importantly, how was his dad. Because his dad had to have lived. Derek had said something about it before but for the life in him, Stiles had a hard time remembering.

 

Then someone's phone rings.

 

Scott is by his side in an instant, matching Derek's speed as they whirl through the snowy forest. “It's mom.” Scott says, yells, whatever. “Your dad's still in surgery!”

 

It's not much but enough to keep Stiles sane. At least for a while. The demon hasn't been inside his head even a whole day now but he already feels the shreds of his sanity fraying, splintering at the edges and wonders how long he can keep it up. Wonders if his pack, if Derek, has any solution to keep him alive once the demon is gone, if they can even jolt it from his body in the first place.

 

The demon tells him that no, they don't have the know-how to do so. It taunts him as the snowy woods hurry past and they appear to the edge of the woods and head towards downtown Beacon Hills. It would, of course.

 

But Stiles still needs to hope.

 

Yet he's so tired now. The demon is slipping at the edges at his consciousness and he's afraid of slipping. Because he knows that if he gives in to it, there's no coming back. No life with having control over his own body, no anything. For he'll be dead and the demon will be free to walk his body around where it sees fit. Stiles wants anything other than that. But the seed of doubt, the beginnings of giving in are growing inside him. For he felt the wound, felt his body, how it ached, felt what dying felt like and it just.

 

He's so so tired.

 

* * *

 

Stiles is laying on the exam table in Deaton's clinic, strapped down to the table, still cagged and Derek feels ill at the sight. It shouldn't be like this but what other choice do they actually even have? He glances up and there is a sigil sprayed onto the ceiling above, something Deaton called a 'devil's trap'.

 

It seems to keep Stiles' body in place despite the restraints, which, apparently are next to useless anyway. The thing possessing Stiles' body has thrown all pretense to the side at the face of it and is showing off it's all-black eyes which make the boy's face look very decidedly alien, very un-Stiles-like.

 

Derek hates it.

 

But maybe it's better, because if the black eyes weren't there, his mind is easily deceived by the way the demon makes use of Stiles' soft expressions. And the others, they're even more susceptible, especially Scott, whom Derek has had to physically restrain from freeing Stiles twice. Because there had been such a pleading look in Stiles warm whiskey eyes and Scott had moved without hesitation. Had been ready to nick the pattern of the devil's trap, the second time.

 

But he's now incapacitated, lying on the floor with both Isaac and Boyd sitting over him.

 

They haven't removed the gag. Because no-one wants to hear the demon using Stiles' voice to abuse them. Nor hear how much of a lost cause Stiles is, how he'll start dying the second the demon's out and will die before they have time to do anything.

 

Derek steps away the examination table and toward Deaton who's on the phone with a hunter called Bobby Singer. Whom the Argents don't know. Derek can't decide if that's good or bad. Apparently, the Argents _know_ who the man is, but they're not in his confidence.

 

“How soon until they can be here?” Deaton's is saying into the phone.

 

“Tomorrow morning,” Derek hears a voice answer at the other end of the line. “They're near enough, last I called. Eight the hours, tops.”

 

“And they know of the... situation?” Deaton glances at Derek with that, eyes gliding over him. Derek wishes he knew what the implies. Hopes Deaton will deign to explain without Derek having to force him to do so.

 

There is a sigh at the other end of the line. “They know,” the other man, Bobby Singer, tells Deaton. “May not be happy about it but from what you're telling me and the Argents being okay with the situation...”

 

There are words left unsaid. Derek hopes he knew this Singer guy to be able to fill them in. He guesses what they must be, either way. Strange hunters coming to his territory makes his hackles rise. He wants to wolf out and sort things that way, prevent any strangers coming anywhere near Stiles. His pack. Even when he knows that he can't. Because Stiles needs the kind of help he can't give. Needs it to survive this. Even if the demon inside is the only thing keeping him alive.

 

“Alright, I'll call you if there's any trouble.” Deaton is finally saying into the phone and ending the call.

 

“Are you sure that those hunters that man is sending here will be able to fix this?” Derek asks, a hint of a growl in his voice. He's resisting the urge to wolf out. He is. Utterly. He's resisting.

 

Deaton looks him up and down, unfazed as ever. “They're experts when it comes to demons.”

 

“But that won't fix the wound, will it?” Isaac asks from the floor.

 

They have all seen it, have made themselves look, have smelled the death on Stiles, even when his body is still moving, still alive, if only just. The reactions were various. Scott insisted they take Stiles into the hospital. Isaac cried and Erica just buried her face against Boyd's chest. But they all knew that no hospital could help Stiles. His body was too broken.

 

And they couldn't risk the demon rampaging around and killing innocent people if they did take him to the hospital. Nor did anyone of them think that they could find a doctor who believed in the supernatural and would stand by as they exorcised the demon.

 

“The bite is a gift.” It's Scott coming into the conversation from where he's still laid down under Isaac and Boyd while Erica glares from across the room.

 

It is a solution. But...

 

“If I bite him after the exorcism the bite won't have enough time to take,” Derek says, hating himself for his words, “and the option...” He can't voice it.

 

Deaton does, because he is who he is. Never shirking from uncomfortable subjects. “Which would be you biting him before the exorcism, the effects of which we don't even know.”

 

Derek closes his eyes and the smell of Stiles blood, the smell of too much of it, assaults his nostrils, mixing with the scent of death which pervades the boys smell all over, having seeped into it until it's all but almost unrecognizable. His legs walk him towards the examination table and he stops. He only opens them when he hears something slithering to the floor. When he turns to look, it's Deaton, making a line of salt in a circle around the table, encompassing Derek within it.

 

“The demon can't cross the salt,” Deaton tells him. “I'll salt all doors and windows after I'm done here. You think you can keep things contained?”

 

Derek nods and turns back to Stiles.

 


	15. On the Edge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> \---

 

_"You must have room to fear new things. I shall make you all new, my own revolution, neither red nor white, but black."_

 

 

As the evening turns into night, they wait. Derek stands within the circle of salt inches from the examination table where Stiles' body is strapped down, gagged and restrained.

 

Stiles is alert. Even when he would give anything to not be. But the demon won't let him slip into the darkness, the inviting oblivion of not being present. It's cowardly of Stiles to want to hide that way, to hide away where he can't see. Yet he still aches to be able to do just that.

 

Because of Derek.

 

Stupid endearing Derek who wears his heart in his sleeve now, who is torturing himself, like it's his fault that the demon slipped into Stiles and took his body on a rampage around town, among his friends, pack, and almost killed his dad.

 

Stiles would be raving and wanting to die if the call hadn't come in. Scott's mom had called to say that Stiles' dad was recovering just fine. Hadn't woken up yet from the anesthesia but was expected to make a full recovery. The demon had raged at that.

 

And now here they were, still. Derek by Stiles. Scott on the other side of the room, being held by Isaac and Allison at his sides, holding him still, holding him in control. Boyd and Erica huddled near them. Deaton standing still. The demon's traps painted onto the ceiling above Stiles the only thing keeping him in place, keeping the demon tethered to the spot. The gag on his mouth the only thing keeping it inside Stiles' body, keeping his body alive.

 

It had been hours since the call between Deaton and that Singer guy. The Winchesters were supposed to come by after dawn. Or something.

 

All good and stuff except Stiles wasn't sure he would survive the night in any case, demon or not.

 

In any case, the demon was straining to get out now, as much as it had fought for control the two times Stiles had slipped back in the gears in lieu of a panic attack. The demon wanted to leave him behind, because whatever demon-fu it was using to keep Stiles' body going, it seemed to not be working that much anymore. Which was, yeah. Just Stiles luck.

 

And he really needed for Derek to stop looking at him with those big guilty eyes. Needed for Derek to stop touching him and leeching the pain away. Really needed that to stop. Now. Right now. Because Derek having to leech away his pain meant that there was pain and if there was pain the demon's hold was slipping and that meant that it was leaving and Stiles would die.

 

Unless Derek gave him the bite.

 

They had decided on that, Stiles knew. Had told him so. And Derek had walked up to him to stand by him, even with the demon and was intending to give him the bite to try and save his life. Even when they didn't know that it would take. Or how it would work with the demon possessing Stiles. Which was... not good. Decidedly not. Not with how the demon was... gleeful at the thought. It couldn't bode well. But aside from non-verbal brain to brain communication, Stiles couldn't really tell his pack to back off.

 

Yet, the alternative was to do nothing and just wait for the Winchesters to come, exorcise the demon and let Stiles bleed to death. Because the hospital wasn't an option. And even if it was, Stiles knows that there's nothing they could do for him. He'd die anyway, just on the operating table.

 

* * *

 

At 5am Derek decides that they can't wait. He can't wait. He's drowning in the scent of Stiles' death, it fills his head until it's all he can think. His eyes can't watch away from the way the bloody shirt sticks to Stiles' skin, where they knife wound is, deadly even bandaged up. They'd done it because they couldn't bear to look at it. That reminder of the mortal peril Stiles was in.

 

Derek balls his hands into fists and stands right by the examination table. He grips one of Stiles arms, leans down and bites.

 

* * *

 

Stiles' world goes black.

 


	16. Nothing Like Reality

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Derek realizes that he can't deny his love for Stiles.

_"It is not about wanting or not wanting. It is about the will in your jaw, and the egg on your back."_

 

What Stiles had ever imagined the bite would feel like, it was nothing like the reality. Not that he had actually entertained the notion seriously before. He hadn't when Peter Hale had asked, but most of that had been because it had been Peter, the creep. Who was now luckily dead. Stiles hadn't thought about what he would say, if he would agree, if Derek had asked him. He never had, had never seemed to be interested in having Stiles in his pack, as a werewolf, at least. Stiles knew that he was pack in some capacity. Knew packs had human members. He was one.

 

Even if Derek kept pushing him away, even if Derek refused to awknowledge the attraction, the tangible pull between them. Despite that, they had always had each others backs, had always made sure neither came to mortal peril, got hurt.

 

Except now Stiles had.

 

Being possessed would have been bad enough, but the things the demon had made Stiles witness, while he was helpless within his own skin, unable to prevent the things the demon made his body do... it had hurts Stiles in ways he wasn't sure he would recover from. If he survived, he was sure that he would have nightmares for years and years. The image of his dad lying on their kitchen floor in a pool of blood would be one of them, it was etched to his memory, along with how broken his dad had sounded. The other would be the way the knife had sunk into his own body, the way it had felt, the demon making sure that Stiles felt every single inch of it as it pierced his heart, even if there had been the numbness after, because apparently the demon hadn't wanted to walk around in his skin while Stiles was screaming in his head in agony.

 

There was no escaping the bite.

 

It was a gift and curse wrapped into one. It was more than Derek just piercing his skin with his fangs, breaking the skin and making blood spurt out, digging deep and working the magic of it. It was... Stiles didn't know what it was other than it hurt like hell. It was like Derek's fangs were fire, it felt like they were rending his flesh into ribbons, digging in deeper than what they actually were, felt like they were hitting bone, scraping it. Maybe they were, Stiles didn't know. He was lost in the blinding agony of it, intensified by the demon, the way it kept half ranting and cackling in his head. It was too much.

 

And then it was over.

 

Stiles arm throbbed in the wake of the bite. He would endure it. If he could have, he would have flinched when Derek touched his arm to wrap a bandage over the bite, covering it but not cleaning it. Not that would have affected the bite, maybe, it would either heal or fester and kill Stiles, there would be no alternate. Stiles could feel the magic of it thrumming through his body and the best of it was... it made the demon antsy. It still clung to his soul, his flesh, with all it's might, but Stiles could tell it was affected, worried even. Which was good, since Stiles had no plans to continue sharing his body with it. He wanted his head to be his own, wanted his words to him self, his senses and his movements. He wanted to be just Stiles, even if that might be were-Stiles if the bite took.

 

“I need you to not fight it, Stiles.” It was Derek and whoa was he close. “Give in.” He says.

 

Give in. Sounds so easy, yet there are two things Stiles could give in to, the demon or the bite. He knows which one Derek means. Doesn't mean that he doesn't think about the other. Especially when the demon is distracting him. Telling him about all the ways that everything can go wrong.

 

Stiles back arches up from the examination table as the demon fights against the magic coursing through Stiles' veins. The demon's control is slipping, slithering, shaking. As Stiles gives in to the bite, invites the magic to fill him, change him, save him, the more the demon fights him. It makes his body convulse and shake. There's a background hum of panicked noises around him, which Stiles can't really concentrate on, can't pinpoint and latch onto.

 

Until...

 

Derek's hands are holding him down, how Stiles knows it's him he couldn't say. He can't really see Derek with the way his eyes are shifting between normal and the inky black sheen of demon vision, but he knows it's him. There's a rush of air against his ear as Derek leans in. Then three words which help him focus, fight, hold on.

 

“I love you.”

 

* * *

 

Derek doesn't really know why he tells Stiles that he loves him, why he leans in, restrains the boy's convulsing fragile body, and whispers the words into his ear. Yes, Derek knows that the words and the meaning behind them, are true, are what he feels, but the situation they're in now, why he says them now, when he couldn't before. He reasons it must be because it might be his last chance to ever say them.

 

Because Stiles might die.

 

And Derek wants to apologize for that too, for possibly killing Stiles. Even when he can't think like that, can't give reign to such thoughts because if he does he can't stop. Won't be able to. And fuck if he doesn't need all his wits to him. Now when Stiles is flitting on the edge between death and life, an edge Derek has pushed him to.

 

So.

 

“I love you Stiles and you'll make it through this.” He repeats his declaration and adds to it, breathing the words into Stiles skin, pressing his lips against his neck. He almost tries to make the words sink in through the sweaty be ingrained in Stiles' skin, sink in deep, down to bone, sinew and flesh. Even when he knows that he has no right to hope for that. Not after rejecting Stiles, earlier, not after not watching over him when he should have been, not when he's bruising Stiles now with the amount of strength that needs to be used to keep the boy's flailing body down. He wishes he could hear Stiles, because he hasn't heard him speak in hours and his words had been breathless, panic-laced and Derek didn't want to remember him that way.

 

Derek is past caring that his beta's have heard his words. Have heard the desperate note in his voice. Have heard the way his heart beats wild, in sync with Stiles, how his blood must be thundering through his veins as he looks down at Stiles, powerless to do anything but hold the boy down and watch him struggle for his life.

 

Against a fucking demon.

 

With all they've come across that fact shouldn't surprise him but it does. He should have been able to protect Stiles from this. From the nightmare he's living through. From the nightmares to come, the memories which will take forever to fade. His heart beats with Stiles', his breath hitches with his and he leeches the pain out, makes himself feel it, punishing himself. Because Stiles pain is his fault. His bite, his pain. If anything, Derek will make sure that Stiles feels no pain, that he'll... No. Stiles will survive this. He has to.

 

If he won't, Derek doesn't know, doesn't want to think what he would do. Now that it has come to this, he knows that he can't deny himself his feelings, that he cannot keep away, can't make himself keep away, shouldn't keep himself away. Because if he does, after this, it will break Stiles even more. It will wreck him beyond anything the boy has already been through now. Derek's rejection and distance would be the last draw and it wouldn't matter that Stiles' body will be alive if his mind would be broken. A werewolf with a broken mind would be something Derek couldn't be able to overlook. And then, then he would have to put an end to Stiles. Kill himself too.

 

Because he loves Stiles all too much, yet not enough to let him have a relatively peaceful death, because alive is better than dead.

 

Stiles writhes.

 


	17. Counting Your Heartbeats

  
_"We obsess. It's our nature."_

 

Derek counts the beats of Stiles heart. Because he has to. If he doesn't, he would grumble, his legs would give up and he would fall down onto the floor below.

The hours tick by, every movement of the clock hands a strike, a blow, a second closer to doom.

Yet, Stiles lives. His body is embracing the bite, Derek thinks how he can almost feel the way the boy's human body is shifting, changing, re-arranging. At least, he can smell the scent of death, which had overlaid Stiles' normal smell, receding, lessening. And it is good. The sulfur smell is still there, the demon not gone, but Derek decides that he doesn't need to think on that.

”What time is it?” He asks the room, his beta's, after what feels like forever. He cannot take his eyes off of Stiles to check it himself, half-afraid that if he were to do so, Stiles could disappear. Could lose the battle, could draw a last rattling breath, his heart beat a last soft and weak beat.

Derek could pick up Stiles in a crowd by his heartbeat yet he has to count, has to observe, obsess.

There's a shuffle of feet behind him. Scott. “7.45,” he says. “Should be coming soon.”

Derek sighs then breathes with Stiles again. He's holding onto Stiles' wrist, the boy had settled in the last hour or so, lying still on the examination table now. There's just him, Stiles, Scott and Deaton in the room now. Boyd and Erica took Isaac home, because he was becoming so distressed the longer Stiles kept trashing.

It's been one of the most violent transformations that Derek has ever seen in his life. Not that he has seen that many, being a born wolf, but he had been there for his other beta's. And none of them had been as violent as Stiles'. For some agonizing moments earlier, Derek had really thought that Stiles would die. But now that he knew that the bite was taking hold, that it wasn't killing Stiles, he still worried.

Would worry until Stiles' scent was back to normal, his eyes stayed the same color and his words were his own.

His worry only grew as he heard gravel scrunch outside and the purr of an engine grind to a halt. The hunters. The wait was over.


	18. Stretched Thin

" _You have already done all of this and will do it again. I am only here to make sure it happens."_  


 

 Stiles breathes with Derek, synchorizing, following Derek's breaths. Or, his body does. The more the bite works on him, the more the magic takes hold on his blood, the more control over it he has, instead of the demon. It's beginning to feel like his own body again yet nothing like it. The wolf sings under his skin, in his bones, in his blood, his muscles. His body makes room for it, accommodates it and his skin soon flesh stretched over too much content. For the demon doesn't want to leave. Not when Stiles is winning his control back. When he's not going to die the minute the demon is gone.


	19. Exorcising Our Demons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Winchesters come to town.

_"Like a passion play. Like a sacrifice."_

 

It's 8am when the Winchester's come. Deaton lets them in and Scott shuffles around, looking at them warily. The brother's share the look. Dean is a little shorter and seems a lot less friendly than his brother Sam who, despite his outward friendliness, surreptiously checks the exits when they come inside the front door. Isaac, Boyd and Erica are at the back with Stiles and Derek, accompanied by Allison, who's there as a sort of buffer, being from a hunter family.

 

This is what Derek hears later from Scott, what the Winchester's do when they come in. They made Scott fidget with the way they looked at him, like they can't believe he looks so human, so normal. They are nothing like the other hunters any of them have ever met. Mostly since they don't actually adhere to the code. Or maybe they have one of their own, but with what they've gotten from Deaton, through Bobby Singer, they're not the most forgiving.

 

But Stiles needs them and that's all that matter for them all.

 

Derek's back tenses as they come into the exam room where Derek's bent over Stiles' still form, strapped down to the table and under the devil's trap on the ceiling.

 

“This the kid?” Dean Winchester asks, rather unnecessarily. His eyes linger on Stiles all too long for Derek's liking. Far too long.

 

Derek doesn't realize that he's growling until the low rumble is already making it's way out of his chest. Which is no good since it's making the hunter reach for his gun. Derek knows that he's not acting rational but he sort of can't help it.

 

“Dean,” Sam Winchester says, laying a hand on his brother's arm, calming. His eyes flick over Stiles too but they're kind and compassionate.

 

The beta's are spread around the room, looking at them. Allison comes forward to greet the hunters. “I'm Allison Argent.” She doesn't shake neither of their hands, holds herself at check and strives to portray authority, which is hard with her youth.

 

And the brother's are experienced. Dean is maybe a little older than Derek, Sam maybe the same age, but both seem hardened and older than their years.

 

“Dean,” the elder brother says, offers Allison his hand and gives her a flirty smile, which makes Scott growl low in his throat. “Argent, huh? Haven't had much to do with your family,” he continues.

 

Allison smiles to Scott in a placating manner and he's at her side with wolf-speed, protective, asserting his claim.

 

Allison stands her ground. “No, you wouldn't. You don't follow the code. I know you've killed werewolves.”

 

“I'm Sam,” Sam butts in, showing Dean aside, glaring at him. He shakes her hand. “We have no grudge with you as long as you're no threat.”

 

“As I explained in the phone, the Hale pack is peaceful and they've never harmed a human.”Deaton adds to the conversation. “It's actually hunters who've caused them more harm.”

 

“Enough!” Derek grinds out. “Can you exorcise this thing in Stiles or not?!” He demands to know. He can feel the way Stiles vibrates with too much inside, himself, the wolf and the demon. “He's running out of time!” He knows that even with the bite having healed the wound on Stiles' chest. There's too many different things inside of Stiles to fit his skin, which looks like it's stretched thin, tight, even when appearing completely normal at the same time.

 

_...thin, sort of stretched, like butter scraped over too much bread._

  
  


Derek shakes his head, he has no room in his head for movie quotes. Even if that movie reminds him of Stiles and the time the pack watched it together, and the novel of him reading it when his family was still alive. Except... the quote flounders in his mind in Stiles' voice, the way he'd said it, saying the lines along with the actor in the movie.

  
  


But this wasn't some old hobbit, this was Stiles, Derek's once human Stiles, now a newborn werewolf with a demon attached to his soul. The situation was so fraught with possible complications that it made Derek hurt to even think about it. And... how long had he thought of Stiles as his?

  
  


He closed his eyes, took a deep breath and then spoke again. “Can you fix him?” He asked in as level a voice as he could manage. He didn't care if it sounded pleading. Begging. He'd rip his beating heart out of his chest and offer it to these two if they only could help Stiles that way.

  
  


And they're right there. Well, the younger one is, the other is staying where he is, focusing on the exits and looking at Derek's packmates with far too much focus. And not so blatantly hitting on Allison even when he's saying nothing, not even deterred by Scott's growl, or his partially wolfed-out face. Seems to egg him on more than anything.

  
  


“You're the alpha, right?” the taller brother asks Derek as he stands to a still next to Derek but still outside the salt line. Derek glances at him, sees the book in his hands. “I'm Sam. Sam Winchester.”

  
  


“Yes. I'm Derek Hale,” Derek grits out, not bothering to withhold his name because it's bound to come up anyway at some point. He doesn't offer the young hunter his hand. Partly because he doesn't want to, _can't_ , let go of his hold on Stiles's wrists. The pulse he feels under his fingertips keeps him focused. He might not shake hands with the man anyway. He doesn't smell as hostile as his brother but he isn't as friendly as his face gives tell and also, there's the underlying scent of sulfur mixed into his blood. Old but still there, just a hint of it.

  
  


It gives Derek pause and he turns more to look at Sam Winchester properly. The words are out before he can stop them, keep them in, swallow them.

  
  


“You've been possessed?”

  
  


Sam stands still, his face drawn, staring at Derek. His heart hammers a little, not scared but not stoic either. He swallows, looks askance and then back at Derek. “Yeah. Both of us have been, at one point.” But we're safe now.”

 

It's not a lie but it's not the complete truth either, Derek can tell. But he doesn't really care one way or another. It's all about Stiles. Doesn't keep him from asking. “What about after, how did you?...” Derek doesn't really quite know what words to use. How can you ask someone who's been possessed what it felt like? How they coped afterward? What kind of nightmares they'd had? He doesn't know what to do with the sympathy he feels for the brother's, either.

 

Sam Winchester scoffs. “Well, being possessed by a demon hasn't been the most horrible life experience that I've had.” A dark shadow crosses past his face until it settles. “I got over it.”

 

Then, he steps over the salt line and Derek's body tenses until he can make it relax, make his wolf see the man as someone there to help, not the threat which is his first reaction. He kind of wants to rebuke him, say it's nothing one could forget. Yet, he was the one who gave Stiles the bite, gave him the bite without his verbal consent, because he couldn't speak, so who is he to say anything.

 

“Ready?” Sam Winchester asks and Derek just nods. Then Sam leans closer to take off the gag and Derek winces. Well, to their credit, no-one had told them they didn't need to have Stiles gagged while he was under the devil's trap.

 

Later, Derek does his utmost to block out the memory of the exorcism. During, he focuses on Stiles' heartbeat, tunes out the demon's ramblings and tries to only hear Stiles' heart, breathing and the Latin exorcism which comes so easily out of Sam Winchester. The words seem so familiar to him, their cadence so practiced that Derek has no doubts that he hasn't exorcised scores of demons.

 

Stiles body arches up on the steel examination table, his bounds snapping, the demon screams and then it's pouring out of Stiles' mouth as thick black smoke. Derek only has eyes for Stiles' face so he doesn't know where it goes after.

 

Before Derek can blink, Stiles is shooting up, up into his arms and sobbing into his shoulder, shaking and trembling, his heart beating a mile a minute. The rush of Stiles, his original scent and the wolf now settled, wash over Derek as he closes his eyes, breathes in deep and just holds Stiles.

 

He doesn't hear what the hunters say, doesn't care. They could shoot him full of wolf's bane bullets and he would die content, as long as Stiles is safe. And he is. For the first time in days, he's safe. Altered, yes. Changed through pain and terror. Whole? Maybe. At least in body if maybe not in mind.

 

“My dad?” Stiles asks with a croaky used and rough voice, very unlike himself.

 

“He's gonna be fine,” Derek tells him, gripping Stiles like he would vanish at any given moment. “I love you, you know?” He whispers into the skin on Stiles' neck, pressing his lips in the wake of his words.

 

“I know,” Stiles answers and all is well. At least until they have to come apart and face the mess the demon made of Stiles' life. “Me too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the end of this part of the series. The story isn't over. There's stuff I'd like to do with the Winchesters. Also, editing. Demon thingies are mangled beyond belief in this, at least as far as SPN goes. Ah, well. 
> 
> Will start the next part of this after the holidays.

**Author's Note:**

> This is being written in responce to prompts from the 31_days prompt community over at livejournal. It was originally supposed to have only the first bit but by the second day it had turned into a series. Hopefully I can wrap it up during December. 
> 
> I'm posting this to my tumblr at lingeringmirth.tumblr.com.


End file.
